


Best Friends

by Anaross



Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/M, Ghosts, Grief/Mourning, Lists, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-03
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-03-15 04:30:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3433652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anaross/pseuds/Anaross
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Buffy reviews her list of reasons why Spike is her best friend just before they mix remembrance with work at a haunting. Post-NFA.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is unfinished and likely to remain so. 
> 
> Not mine. Joss's. I will turn them back to him anytime he wants.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Buffy POV in this section.

Six reasons Spike ended up my best friend:

1)     Process of elimination. My two previous best friends aren't around anymore.  
  
a. Willow. We had a fight. We've had fights before, and always made up. This one … well. It was about something important.  We didn't make up.  
  
b. Xander.  This one was easier.  I mean, Xander would probably say we're still friends.  And we are, or we will be once he breaks up with that girlfriend, the one who is too innocent and too good and too gosh-darn sweet to be corrupted by all sorts of nasty info like, you know, the existence of demons and vampires.  
  
c. So what about my sister. Sisters are best friends who live with you, right?  Or who had the same parents. Or something else that doesn't apply either.  
  
d. No. Don't ask. I don't want to talk about her.  
  
e. Angel? Well, he's been a lot of things to me, but never friends. Just like Spike said that once.  We'd never be friends, me and Angel. That's what Spike said, and he was right.  
  
f. He probably never imagined, back then, that he and I would end up friends.  But we did.

2)          He stuck around, you know what I mean? Okay, there was that year he was hanging with Angel, and how weird was that? Sometimes I wonder what they talked about. _You_ , Spike says with that grin that makes me totally want to smash his pretty face in.  Me. Big topic of convo between them. I can always tell when he's lying, and I don't think he's lying about this. He probably bragged about the five-hours-straight thing. He would. Just to get Angel mad. And I guess I understand that. Anyway, there was that year, but otherwise, when I think about it, we've pretty much been together, one way or another, since, hmmm, since he was with Drusilla and I still had what seemed like a hopeless crush on Angel.

3)          We used to be--  Okay. We're exes. Ex-something.  Spike would say, or he would have said awhile ago, anyway, that we're ex-lovers.  But we don't talk about that anymore, that year when we were… something. He'd rather talk about those years we were enemies.  That's what he's nostalgic about, now that we're best friends. Anyway, once you've been … something… you either break up completely or you become friends, and when you know each other like we do, you kind of have to become best friends, if you're going to be friends.  Cuts down on the threat of blackmail.

4)          Best friend is a pretty handy way to introduce me.  See, Spike usually has a girlfriend. He's never been any good at being alone.  He gets restless and moody and drinks too much, if he's alone.  So he's usually got some girlfriend who wonders what the heck I am to him, and it helps to say, "Oh, we're best friends. Best  _platonic_  friends."  
  
These girlfriends. It's sort of interesting. I mean, this is the guy who stuck with crazy Drusilla for a century, right?  But he doesn't stick with these girlfriends. I don't mean he dumps them. He just chooses women who are unavailable, or shortly to become unavailable.  There was the singer who was scheduled to go on tour in three weeks. Well, Spike gave her something to sing about, I guess.  And there was the 29-year-old Westic demon.  Westics all die when they turn 30.  He was like her last hurrah.  I can understand that.  If I knew I was going to die in a few weeks, I'd make Spike my last hurrah too.  And there was that movie star. I could have told him—in fact, I did tell him, not that he listened—that she was just slumming with him.  As soon as she got that nomination, she dropped him.  Too bad.  If she'd taken him to the awards ceremony, it might have been my one chance to see him in a tux (she lost, yay, and let me just say, the camera zoomed in on her face when the winner was announced, and she's such a lousy actress, everyone could tell it wasn't an honor just to be nominated).  
  
Then there was Faith.  Yeah.  You think he would have figured out that slayers make bad girlfriends.  Well, I guess he's a slow learner, because she came into town supposedly to consult with me on the latest slayer handbook, but really because she heard we were just friends ( _just_  friends—what a stupid term).  And she always had the hots for him.  Even back when—way back when.  So I got to witness their re-encounter. They looked at each other, and in the time it took me to decide I better stop this, they were already in bed.  That lasted a couple weeks. I thought he and I kind of had a tempestuous romance, but we were like, I don't know. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, maybe.  Compatible, anyway.  And they were like Sid and Nancy. (He'd understand what I mean, even if you don't.)  The breakup registered 9.6 on the Richter scale.  I never did get out of either of them what the problem was. Faith muttered something like he liked foreplay too much and she was more slam-bam-thankyou-sir, but that couldn't have been it.  Spike was awfully good at foreplay, and I think he could probably convince even Faith that it was a great way to waste an hour or so.   
  
And besides, even his tendency to linger too long in the kissing-this and licking-that stage didn't keep her from coming back three months later, and then six months later, wearing her tightest leathers and smiling that smile at him.  She'd do it right in front of me. And he'd smile back, right in front of me.   
  
Couple weeks. That's all they can manage.  But if she comes back to town, he'll fall for it all over again. Like I said. Slow learner.  He's a slayer-junkie. Next time, seriously, I'm going to do an intervention. 

5)          We're business partners.  We're in the demon-location-and-execution and occult-investigation business.  I guess he was paying attention that year he spent at the evil lawfirm, because here I was, innocently assuming he'd help me out with my slayer work just out of the goodness of his heart, or out of love for me, or out of the urge for adventure, or whatever.  Instead, he started bargaining, and next thing I know, we had an office and a Yellow Pages ad and one very big client (Angel and the evil lawfirm—we only take on non-evil assignments, trust me).  At least I got my name first. The stenciling on the office door says "Summers and Spike," even though that's not alphabetical order.  
  
We're good at fighting together, but we're not good at business together.  We disagree on fundamentals, like whether he really needs that Aeron chair.  (Come on. He's a vampire. Even if the Office Max chair hurts his back, it'll heal in about three minutes.  I should know— heck, I broke his back myself, years ago, and he was out of the wheelchair in what seemed like days.) That year in the Wolfram & Hart building gave him kind of expensive taste in office furniture.  And come on, we can run off business cards on the printer. We really don't need the engraved model.  And you'd think if either of us would fall for a sob story and "forget" to bill some sorry client, it would be me, the one with the soul, right? (Okay, he has a soul now too, but it sure didn't stop him from drinking and drugging and doing women, so why it means he tosses half our accounts receivable into the wastebasket, I don't know.)  
  
So what I'm saying is, if we weren't best friends, we'd be arguing all the time.  Well, we argue all the time anyway, but we always make up right away. That's what best friends do.  Make up.

6)          We've been everything else to each other.  Best friends is best.  We aren't going to kill each other. And we're not going to hurt each other.  This is the safest we've ever been.  
  
And I need to be safe now. Just for awhile.  He understands that. That's what best friends do. Understand.

So I just had this hunch, that night I was house-sitting for the movie producer haunted by the ghost of the screenwriter he'd driven to suicide, that Spike would come bearing best-friend gifts (microwave popcorn, a DVD, and beer for him and Snapple for me, and a box of See's chocolates too).

And he didn't say it, but he didn't have to. We're best friends. We can read each other's minds, or at least each other's faces. And he knew I didn't want to be alone that night.  It was the two-year anniversary, see.  And that DVD he brought--  it was Shaun of the Dead. He and Dawn used to watch that together and just howl with laughter.  They had the same twisted sense of humor.  A vampire comedy.  (Zombies! they'd both yell, if they heard me call it that.  But undead is undead to me.)

So he appeared at the front door, his hair all wet and curly from the evening rain, and I invited him in, and we sat down in the fancy screening room and watched that movie together, Spike and me.  Holding hands (see why we're not  _just_  friends? We're not  _just_  anything). Holding hands and laughing and maybe crying a little, and remembering Dawn.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is for Nan Dibble, who never forgot.
> 
> Spike POV in this section.

The film ended, and that stupid bloody song came on over the credits, and Buffy turned to me, her eyes bright as she sang along.

_"You're my best friend_  
 _Oh_  
 _Oh you're my best friend_  
 _Ooo you make me live_  
 _You -- you're my best friend."_

So of course, as the music faded, she had to cuddle up to me and whisper, "You are my best friend, aren't you?"

And I had to say yes—hell, it was probably even true, and that was all the sadness in the world right there, wasn't it?  Then she pulled away, a frown furrowing her pretty forehead, and she added, very somberly, "And I'm your best friend too. Right?"

She wasn't.  Never needed one of those, did I?  Needed a lover, that's true.  A leader now and again.  Not a friend.  I did have friends, over the years.  Got drunk with a few and even trusted them not to stake me, Charlie Gunn being the last one, and I suppose it was a compliment of sorts, him not staking me, when he'd staked his own sister. (Not his sister anymore, he'd say. A vampire who took over her body. Too bad he said that to me, the one who knew better and wouldn't hesitate to say so, and I would've said so, if it wouldn't have hurt him too bad. Besides, he already knew.)  Probably wasn’t affection that stilled his stake… apathy, maybe.  Been with Angel so long, he'd forgotten he ever cared about ending evil and vanquishing vampires.  (That's not fair of me to say that.)

"I am your best friend, aren't I? Spike?" 

Turned my attention back to her—never drifted far anyway—and should have said no.  Many things, my slayer was, but …  well, not that.  But it meant something to her, and it was just words, after all. She was best, that much was true.   And I could say that, and she could believe it to mean whatever she needed it to mean. "Absolutely the best."

She put her hands on my chest and curled the fingers in my shirt. Just enough to remind me she could reach in and yank out my heart, if she wanted. (If she hadn't already, a few dozen times.)  "So are you going to fuck me now?"

I saw it right away, how jealous she was of Faith, that she'd say it like that, like she imagined Faith would say it. (Not that way. Faith wouldn't pose it as a question, would she?  _You're going to fuck me. Now._   That was how Faith would say it. Did say it, often enough.)  Warmed my heart, it did, that Buffy took the time to feel that way.  Never seemed to care much about the other women (fair's fair, only a man, man's got his needs, etc.), but Faith bothered her. Mightily. 

Reckon that was right enough.  Not that it was anything about love, Faith and me.  She wouldn't know what to do with love, and anyway, I didn't have any love to offer, it all being directed at that other slayer.  But if I didn't love Buffy, I could love Faith, and we both knew it, and that scared her.  She didn't want to be loved.  Told me that not in words--  Faith wouldn't have those words. All she had was her imperious hand, shoving mine away, telling me to get to it, for crissakes, just put it in and get it done, like a man should. Made me wonder what her other men had been like. Selfish, that was what. Taught her that was what manhood was, and womanhood too, selfishness. Well, I'd never been that, not in bed, not in life, not in unlife.   Didn’t lose by giving, learned that lesson early, didn't lose it when I lost the soul, didn't lose it when I regained the soul either.  (Nothing to do with good or evil.  The best people were the most selfish, that much I'd noticed.)  All wasted on Faith… but maybe not, because she kept coming back, all angry and demanding and resisting.  Tempting me to love, and triumphant when I didn't.  She had to play with that fire.

But I shouldn't be thinking of her when I was with Buffy.  They were nothing alike, the two of them, for all that they were both slayers, and both demanding in their own ways.

There was a question on the table.  I said, "No," and saw Buffy's eyes cloud over, the way they did when she felt, and I added, not meaning to, "No. I'm going to make love to you."

And so she came into my arms, all warm, and kissed me, her eyes all sunshine again.

We did this occasionally.  It killed me, every time, but I kept on with it.  Drawn to that fire too, I guess.  Sometimes Buffy needed it, needed me, needed my love to manifest some way she could believe. Or could dismiss, perhaps.  Perhaps it just made her feel normal for a bit, a girl with her man.  

She was polite enough about it.  She always waited until I was free—didn't face me with that choice to cheat, because that was never my way.  And she always asked first. Didn't just take me, like she once would have done.  Recognized now that I had a choice here.  Even recognized the possibility, bare though it was, that I might refuse.

Not that I ever had.  Or ever would. 

So it broke my heart, but vampires heal quick.  I kissed her back, willing her eyes to close, and when they'd drifted shut, I rose and pulled her to her feet.  "What time's the ghosty due?"

She stood there, eyes closed, all mystery, all woman, and smiled.  "He comes by every night at 3 am.  We have a few hours.  Got any idea how to fill it?"

"One or two."

Instinct led me to the bedroom. Well, she did—she'd been here before, or maybe she just smelled those fancy Egyptian cotton sheets even this far away.  She held my hand and sang under her breath, that bloody stupid song,

_"You're the first one_  
 _When things turn out bad_  
 _You know I'll never be lonely_  
 _You're my only one_  
 _And I love the things_  
 _I really love the things that you do_  
 _You're my best friend."_

She was right. So was Faith. Fucking was the only thing would take care of this.  Make it go away, the need, the pain. Or bring it back, but only to me.  And that was the way it should be. I felt best when I was feeling--  


_"Ooh I've been wandering round_  
 _But I still come back to you_  
 _In rain or shine."_

I almost pulled her to a halt, almost told her to stop singing. But we were passing through a big hallway, with the French doors at the end open to the night chill, and I felt it—the chill, the night—

And something else passed through me, particles of care. 

It felt like I was incorporeal again.  It felt like I was dusting—like I was burning up again in the Hellmouth. Only it was cool like the night, and I was still solid.  Just chilled and broken and dissolved… . I let go of Buffy's hand and fell to my knees.

_Ewww. I should have known—_

_God, the two of you. So gross. Do you like do it all the time?_

_Best fri—_

_Can you hear me, Major Tom—_

_Lonely out here in space…._

_Did you forget me, both of you?_

_  
_She left then, and the French doors slammed shut.  All those particles gone, nothing left but rain on my face.

"Bit," I whispered, and Buffy caught me.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published on LiveJournal in April 2007.


End file.
